Promises to Keep
by ShellSueD
Summary: On a mission gone horribly wrong, memories of Stephanie and a promise he made to her are all that keep Ranger going through the worst moments of his life. Will those be enough to get him home to her? One-shot, complete.


Big thanks to_** LilyGhost**_ for looking this over, for her suggestions and for encouraging me to post it.

**AN:** JE owns the rights to all recognizable characters – all mistakes are mine.

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Sleep is only possible in short intervals. Minutes, at the most an hour, and only during the day. He notes the sun's position in the sky but doesn't remember if he's slept yet today. It is noon, and he needs to rest so he'll have energy when night falls. He checks his supplies; it rained last night so he has water but he's nearly out of food. He will have to hunt again soon.

He knows this jungle well; knows what it takes to survive it. He's made it out before. But he hadn't been alone last time and he hadn't been injured.

He touches the wounds on his side and the skin is hot beneath his fingers. He'd been able to dig out two of the slugs but the last was buried too deep. That one causes the most discomfort.

Two weeks. He thinks that's how long it's been but he's starting to lose track. He tries to keep his brain engaged, tries to recall the details; tries to remember what went wrong. Only fragments will come to him.

But thoughts of her have a tangible clarity. Thoughts of her keep him from losing the rather tenuous hold he has on his sanity.

Only thoughts of her keep his mind from completely disintegrating into madness.

The last time they kissed, that's the memory he conjures most often now. When he closes his eyes he can almost feel her lips touching his. They are so soft – _so very, very soft_ and he thinks he could be happy for the rest of his life if only he were able to kiss them every day.

Half of him knows it isn't real, but he hears his name fall from her mouth on a soft sigh and he can see those eyes, those endless blue eyes, boring right into his soul.

"_Promise me,"_ she says. _"Promise me that wasn't a good-bye kiss." _

His eyes snap open at an unknown noise and he lies completely still inside the shelter he has managed to construct for himself. He is nearly out of ammunition, but he cradles the gun to his chest, his finger on the trigger.

A twig snaps and his finger flexes slightly. The rest of him doesn't move. He doesn't even breathe.

The distinctive grunt of an unmistakable mammal breaks his rigidity. Sure that it was drawn to him by the scent of weakness and imminent death, he slowly reaches for the knife at his side.

The wild boar doesn't make a sound as the blade slices through its jugular veins.

He knows he will have to move now. Other animals or the worse alternative, other _humans_, will smell the blood, but at least he will have sustenance and thinks it will be enough, at least for a few days. He works quickly, ignoring the piercing pain in his side, ignoring the heat of fever ravaging his body, and cuts away the meat from the corpse at his feet.

A fire must be small and extinguished quickly and like sleep, only attempted during the day. He cooks as much of the pig as he can in the short amount of time he allows and leaves the rest for scavengers. He marks a tree before he moves on, knowing the futility, but it's all he has now. The tracker that should have saved them stopped transmitting several days before.

He moves north, always north and looks for a new place to rest, if only for a minute. Time passes strangely now – a moment like an hour, a day in an instant. All he knows is it's running out.

A dense crop of trees that form a twisted semi-circle is where he stops. His arms ache from hacking through the bush with his machete and he must eat before he attempts more sleep. He devours a piece of meat, washes it down with rain water and then retrieves the camouflage netting from the pack of gear he carries with him. Using that and flora gathered from the forest, he becomes nearly invisible against the trunks of the trees.

He leans his head back, closes his eyes and she comes to him.

"_Promise me, Ranger."_

He wishes, oh how he wishes he didn't have to break that promise.

It's nearly dark when he startles awake. He'd been dreaming of her and let himself sleep way too long. As he packs up to leave he thinks he can almost smell the gentle scent of her perfume and it makes his heart ache inside his chest.

Night is the hardest for him. He must stay awake and alert. They hunt for him at night. At least he has to assume they are still searching for him. If they are any good, and he knows they are, they would have gone back to burn the bodies and discovered them missing. Two of them, anyway. He'd left the third man on his team behind.

"_Stop this, Ranger. It wasn't your fault." _It's Ram's voice in his head now. _"You promised you'd stop blaming yourself."_

He touches the extra set of dog tags around his neck and fights back the urge to scream. I'm sorry, Ram. I'll stop. I swear I'll stop.

But he won't stop. He'll break this promise, just like all the others. He promised him he wouldn't lose his leg. He promised him everything would be okay. He promised that he'd get them home.

What good is a promise to a ghost, anyway?

He marks a tree and heads north.

Dizziness hits him unexpectedly and he stumbles a few steps before sinking to his knees on the jungle floor. His side throbs; his head throbs and he knows he must take the last of the aspirin from his pack or he won't be able to continue. He can't stay here. Can't stay in one spot for too long, not at night.

The pills are bitter on his tongue but he swallows them with a sip of water and waits in the hollow of an enormous banyan for the pain to subside. He closes his eyes for a few minutes. Only a few minutes and then he must move on.

"_Wow, I think that's the first time I've ever heard you laugh like that." _Her voice is full of wonder and he knows in that moment that he loves her. Actually, he knew the first time he kissed her but he pushed it away. Buried it deep down where he didn't dare to venture but she kept pulling it out, making him feel things he never allowed before her. _"Your smile is deadly, you know that, right?"_

That same smile is on his lips when he opens his eyes. The sun is starting to pull itself over the horizon and he curses softly, realizing he'd been sleeping. During the night. He's lucky they didn't find him and slit his throat while he slept.

He feels a little better. The dizziness has passed. He takes two sips of water before leaving his mark and moving north to find a place to rest for the day.

A make-shift shed appears before him and he thinks he must be hallucinating but it's still there after he rubs his eyes. He knows this shed; he's slept in this shed. It's a good sign. It means he's close to the end. He's close to rescue. He's close to her.

_God_, what he wouldn't give to touch her again. Just one more time. To feel her skin on his. Her hands on his face. Her lips on his.

He circles around behind the structure, his gun in his hand, listening for any signs of life. Any signs that the enemy is lying in wait for him inside the little haven. But there is nothing and he enters the space, falling to the ground in silent exhaustion.

"_You promised her you'd come home and you're nearly there. Hold on." _Ram's voice in his ears again. His hand goes automatically to his neck as his head hits the floor with a soft thump. I'm trying, Ram. I'm really trying.

It took him hours to dig the shallow grave that hid Ram's body from scavenging animals and from the enemy no doubt scouring the jungle for them. He'd left Lopez at the extraction site after the ambush. Lopez was unknown to him and a last minute addition to the team ordered by the Colonel himself. He knew something was off. He and Ram both knew but they didn't have time to contest.

The details of those last few seconds that had been eluding him come sharply into focus as he lies on the ground in the shed. His breath expels in shallow gasps and his heart races as the images play in his mind.

He saw the glint of metal in the trees right before the shots were fired but his warning went unheard over the approaching rotors. He grabbed Ram and yanked him to the ground a second too late. He watched Lopez's skull explode as bullets tore into Ram's leg and sliced through his own side. They lay on the ground, bleeding and watching as the chopper laid some return ground fire before dipping and turning and flying off without them.

That last effort of the helicopter pilot effectively sent the enemy into retreat and an hour passed without movement before he felt safe enough to heft Ram over his shoulder and beat a path to the tree line; to the relative cover of the heavily forested jungle.

"_You should have left me." _

"_I couldn't, Ram. You know that."_

"_Yeah, I know." He looks away but takes Ranger's hand, pressing his tags into his palm. "I don't have much time," he says and the harsh, raspy sound of his voice twists at Ranger's gut and strips him of his ability to speak. He lays his free hand on Ram's shoulder, squeezes gently. _

"_Get them to my family."_

"_I will, I promise," Ranger says as the last breath of life leaves Ram's lungs._

Another promise he won't be able to keep. He closes his eyes as his fist encases the dog tags around his neck and wishes for Stephanie. She comes quickly as sleep overtakes his broken and tired body.

In his dream, she is with him. He feels her body pressed against his. He can feel her arms around him as he buries his face in her hair, inhales the soft scent. The sweet taste of her skin as he runs his tongue over her bare shoulder sends a shiver down his spine. He clings to her. He doesn't ever want to let her go. Everything is okay now, here, where he can hold her.

"_What's wrong? You seem so…sad tonight." _

_He pushes a stray hair from her face and tucks it behind her ear. "Nothing, Babe. I'm just enjoying being here with you."_

_She tips her head up and presses her lips to his in a soft and gentle kiss. Her eyes close automatically as he opens his mouth to accept her seeking tongue but his remain open, wide open. He is committing every second of this night to memory and does not want to miss a single expression. A small, contented sigh falls from her mouth and that sound goes in the vault. He knows he'll want to remember every look, every smile, every noise that she makes when he's knee deep in whatever shit awaits him tomorrow._

_When she breaks the kiss and leans her head back, her blue eyes meet his with raw, undisguised passion. "Promise me, Ranger. Promise me that wasn't a good-bye kiss. Promise me you're coming back."_

"_I promise, Babe. I promise."_

His eyes open reluctantly. He wants to linger there, in her essence just a little bit longer but it will be night soon and he'll have to move on. North. Always north.

He should have told her. He knows he should have told her but he wanted to believe it. He wanted to be able to make that promise and actually mean it but he knew this mission was different. Knew from the beginning there was more than a good chance he wouldn't make it back but he wanted to believe. He wanted _her_ to believe.

A sudden chill on the back of his neck has him up and crouched on his toes, his gun in one hand, and his hunting knife in the other. It's a sixth sense all soldiers have that kicks in when you can feel the enemy with a kind of internal radar. That sensation means only one thing. Someone is here. Someone is watching him and it is not an animal.

But he's trapped now, trapped inside this shelter. There is no escaping without being seen so he crouches and he waits. He'll kill as many as he can before he dies. That's the least he can do for Ram.

His weapon is locked and loaded, his knife blade is sharp. He is ready for the end. It's been too long in this jungle. Too many hopes crushed. Too many promises broken.

He stops breathing when a voice sounds. It is soft, but it's nearby and it takes him a second to realize it's a voice he knows.

"They have to be close. The last mark was over a klick back." Tank. Tank is here. He thinks his fever must be finally winning the war it's been raging with his sanity because this can't possibly be reality.

"We've covered every viable option, if they're anywhere, it has to be here." Bobby. _Jesus, that's Bobby._

He finds he can't move, frozen in disbelief.

The voices go silent and he knows they have spotted the shed. He closes his eyes and can see them getting into formation. A three man team, it's always a three man team. One will circle around behind, one will approach from the side and the third, the suicide bomber, will go in the front with his M16 out and his finger on the trigger.

He does not put down his weaponry. In case he is wrong, in case his mind is finally and fully lost to him, he will go out fighting. To the death.

"Jesus fucking Christ." Lester. His face appears behind the barrel of the gun and Ranger falls into his arms in relief. In exhaustion. In hope that what he sees is real.

Lester pulls him out of the shelter and Bobby and Tank close ranks around him.

"Fuck, he's burning with fever." Bobby kneels at his side, his hand pressing to Ranger's forehead.

"Where's Ram?" Tank demands in his quiet tone while his eyes and his gun constantly sweep the jungle, always on alert.

Ranger tries to speak but all that comes out is a raspy grunt and Bobby is digging in his pack. "He's dehydrated…"

"And fucking shot. Look at this." Lester lifts Ranger's shirt, exposing the wounds on his side.

"Shit. It's infected. We gotta get him out of here. _Now_."

Lester nods. "The extraction site is less than a klick north. I'll radio our ride."

"I'll sweep the perimeter," Tank adds and disappears from sight.

Bobby is cleaning his wounds as best he can and Ranger winces when he applies pressure to the hole where a bullet remains.

"Is there still one in there?" he asks and Ranger can only manage a nod. He takes out a syringe and injects a clear liquid into Ranger's arm. "If it makes you feel better, we ran into the assholes that gave you these holes. They were pretty irritated that they couldn't seem to find you."

"Fuckers," Lester chimes in, crouching on Ranger's other side. "They won't be searching for anyone anymore. Ever."

His eyes close and he nods again. That _does_ make him feel better. Or maybe it's whatever drug Bobby has administered. He no longer feels any pain.

"How did you find me?" he asks and his voice sounds odd. Whispery and rough. "Tracker died."

"Starting to fly?" He opens his eyes and Bobby is grinning at him. His teeth are impossibly white against his dark skin that is covered with camouflage paint and mud. "You didn't make it easy, but we were trained by the best."

Lester is grinning too and Ranger smiles back. "We followed your marks, just like you taught us."

"At least you listened to _something _I said," he says and Lester looks at Bobby. "You must have given him the happy juice because that was sort of sarcastic."

Ranger finds himself laughing but he knows without a doubt it was only partially his influence that made them the soldiers they are. There are only a handful of men that could have found him even with his training, and he's looking at three of them. Pride and gratitude and admiration swells in his chest as Tank joins them.

"We're clear to bug out of this shithole," he informs them and Ranger clutches at the chains around his neck. His heart shatters at the thought of leaving without Ram.

"Since you're wearing his tags, I'm assuming he didn't make it."

Rangers head shakes and they all look away into the trees as if the ghost of their friend might appear at any second.

"Fuck," Lester whispers and Tank clears his throat before giving the order.

"Santos, you're on point. Let's move out."

Lester hefts his weapon with a nod and heads into the trees. Bobby follows leaving Tank and Ranger alone.

Tank helps him stand up. "Someone told me you promised to come home," he says as he adjusts his ammo belt.

"Yeah, I did."

"Well, that was stupid. But since she threatened to shoot me with my own gun if I didn't bring you back with me, I will make sure you keep that promise."

"I'd appreciate it," Ranger says, never meaning anything more in his life. His eyes close briefly and he can almost feel the warmth of her embrace, the gentle touch of her fingers to his cheek.

"I know." Tank says and Ranger opens his eyes to meet his friend's gaze of understanding. No more words are spoken as Tank half carries, half drags him out of the jungle. None are needed because they are going home.

He's keeping his promise and going home.

To her.


End file.
